Don Ruzicka and Joel Salatin are grass farmers who have found a way to make a living on the farm while sustaining the land base and enhancing the life around them.
They are coming to Saskatoon Nov. 16-18 to share their approaches at the Organic Connections conference.
“We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us,” says Ruzicka, a third generation Alberta farmer who uses this quote from Aldo Leopold to sum up his approach to farming.
“When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.”
Read Also
Crop insurance’s ability to help producers has its limitations
Farmers enrolled in crop insurance can do just as well financially when they have a horrible crop or no crop at all, compared to when they have a below average crop
Don and Marie Ruzicka’s model of farming is based heavily on the same principles of management as those pioneered by Joel Salatin of Polyface Farms in Virginia. Both characterize themselves as grass farmers because they focus on the production of grass. The beef, pork and poultry they raise are byproducts of the grass.
Salatin popularized the idea of chicken tractors: large pens that are moved across pastures to give birds access to fresh grass. As well as pasture poultry, he promotes pigaerator pork, salad bar beef and forage-based rabbits. All these systems give animals frequent access to new pasture, improving their use of the plants and reducing the spread of parasites and diseases. The animals are seen not simply as a source of income but also as tools of land management.
Ruzicka’s methods follow Salutin’s principles. In summer, he uses rotational grazing for cattle and movable pens for chickens and hogs. In the winter Ruzicka’s cows are fed in the field using bale feeders. The hogs are then pastured on these sites and the hay and manure left by the cattle becomes valuable feed rather than waste.
Ruzicka uses a hand-operated grass spreader to spread nitrogen-enhancing alfalfa and cicer milk vetch on bare patches near salt and mineral feeders. Because the cattle will follow him anywhere, he walks around the area he wants to seed after a rain and lets the multitude of hooves work the seed into the ground for him. He says this is like the old way the bison enriched the land.
Ruzicka has also found cattle useful for weed control. One successful technique has been to spray undesirable plants with salt water. Because the cattle like the taste, they eat even prickly leaved thistles. Molasses also worked.
“You can create a culture within the cattle that they will come to eat thistle without spraying anything on the plants.”
When scentless chamomile became a problem around sloughs, Ruzicka addressed it using the principles of holistic management. He fenced off half an acre and grazed 200 cattle until the ground was black. He did this with all the scentless chamomile patches on his farm and was able to eradicate them within five years.
This approach, while effective, is only appropriate in extreme situations. Generally Ruzicka’s approach is to keep the ground covered, especially going into winter.
“There must always be carryover in the pastures,” he said.
“We are always asking if there is a drought coming up. We are setting the table for next spring. I look at nature as a barometer of how well we are managing the land.”
Little hedgerows of trees at the edge of fields and roads are a plethora of activity. A visiting wildlife biologist observed six newly arrived species of birds on the farm this year.
When Ruzicka fenced off the dugouts, grass grew, providing habitat for dragonflies that eat small grasshoppers and mosquitoes.
When it comes to marketing, Ruzicka uses Salatin’s advice: “The product must taste good, it must have a story and the farm mustromance the consumer.”
The Ruzickas direct market as much as possible. Like Salatin, Ruzicka hopes his customers will share the larger farm experience.
“We want to get them out to the farm and show them what we are doing,” he said.
“We don’t think enough about the spirituality of the land. Our existence is tied to the earth.”
Visitors say they have a feelingof peace when they stay in his log guest cabin, which is what he wishes for his guests: that they experiencea feeling of peace, the farm is pleasurable to visit and the food tastes good.
For more information about the Organic Connections conference, visit www.organicconnections.ca or phone Lorraine at 956-3110.
Tracy Salisbury is an assistant in Organic Research and Extension at the University of Saskatchewan. She collaborated with Brenda Frick, senior research and extension associate for Organic Agriculture Centre of Canada at the University of Saskatchewan. They welcome comments at 306-966-4975 or organic@usask.ca. OACC articles are archived at www.oacc.info.
